Term Of Friendship
by otherhawk
Summary: Friends are there when you need them for whatever you need. Pairing - Rusty/Livingston. What? I like it.


**Disclaimer: I own nothing to do with O11.  
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**A/N: The title was InSilva's idea. *round of applause*  
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* * *

Really, Livingston thought he shouldn't have been at all surprised to come home to see Rusty sitting in the hallway outside his apartment, licking the coating off a candy apple. Not that he was expecting Rusty. Not that he'd even _heard _from Rusty in over a year now. But still, really, nothing that Rusty did should ever surprise him. Rusty wandered happily in and out of people's lives and that was that.

Rusty looked up and smiled as he came along the corridor, and Livingston found himself automatically smiling back. "Hey, Livingston."

"Hi, Rusty. Long time no see. I mean, not that I think you should have come by or anything," he added hastily. "Just...it's good to see you." It was. It always was. And he found himself looking closely, and he couldn't help but notice that Rusty looked tired. Not just physically. He looked tense and worn out. And, all things considered, Livingston guessed that he really shouldn't be surprised.

"Good to see you too," Rusty said and the smile reached his eyes. "You busy? I got wine." He held up the bottle as evidence, and then laid it down again, concentrating on sucking enthusiastically at a recalcitrant bit of candy.

Fascinated, Livingston watched, and Rusty's lips were sticky, and Livingston had to quickly take a moment to rhyme off all the reasons why they'd decided long ago they were better as friends. "Have you got another candy apple?" he asked, largely involuntarily as he opened the door.

Rusty got to his feet gracefully and threw the remains of the candy apple down the garbage shoot opposite. "I _did," _he said apologetically. "You're a little later than I expected."

Livingston stared after the apple. "Did you actually taste any of the fruit?"

Rusty shrugged. "I like the candy better," he said, and he followed Livingston inside. "Glasses?"

"The cupboard next to the sink," Livingston called, hanging his coat up and following Rusty into the kitchen. "And I bet you can't even remember the last time you saw a dentist."

"Fourteen months ago," Rusty said instantly, with a suspicious looking smile.

They made their way to the sofa and Rusty poured the wine. It was good.

"You saw a dentist fourteen months ago?" Livingston prompted, maybe a little disbelievingly.

"Yeah. Martin Kane. Dentist with a few...interesting...hobbies. We...I...wanted to get into his office." He looked momentarily pensive. "No plan should involve more than one drill."

Livingston smiled and wondered whether Danny's main aim had been to deal with Martin Kane or to get Rusty to visit the dentist. Not that he was going to suggest that. He wasn't going to mention Danny till Rusty did. As far as everyone else was concerned it might be six months since Danny went to prison; for Rusty it probably felt like yesterday. Whatever Rusty was looking for, Livingston was perfectly content to let him set the tone and the pace.

"And he didn't happen to mention that fruit is good and candy is bad?" he asked lightly instead.

Rusty looked momentarily offended. "I'm not going to start taking advice from marks. Where would it end?" He grinned and shook his head. "You said you were working? Anything fun?"

"Yeah," Livingston agreed, sipping his wine. "Nothing illegal though." He caught the look Rusty gave him and shook his head despairingly. "Honestly, things can be one without the other," he sighed.

"Occasionally," Rusty allowed and he looked a little more relaxed than he had. "So, what are you doing?"

"Art," Livingston explained. "Well. _I'm _not," he added quickly. "Murray, this friend of an ex of mine...actually I guess he's my friend now. We started hanging out after Teddy went to Melbourne to find himself."

Rusty frowned. "Why did he think he'd left himself there?"

"Don't know why he thought he was worth finding," Livingston muttered. "Anyway, Murray is an artist, or a concept artist rather, I think, and he's got this installation going into this gallery. All about surveillance and paranoia, so he asked me to help. It involves some visitors being given camcorders, and being told to film what they see as they go round the gallery. Except we're also installing a camera system – a really, really obvious one – and the cameras are programmed to film anyone with a camcorder. All the camcorders have a tracking chip, and the cameras will actually move to follow them," he explained, gesturing enthusiastically with his hands. "That's where I come in," he added, probably unnecessarily.

Rusty blinked. "And that's art?"

"Yes," Livingston shrugged. "Apparently."

"It's worth money?" Rusty persisted thoughtfully.

Livingston glared, not altogether seriously. "My friend, remember? Whatever you're thinking, stop."

"Okay," Rusty agreed easily, and there was a moment of silence and Rusty was frowning. "But you can make the cameras follow what you want them to?"

"Uh, yes," Livingston agreed.

Rusty smiled. "We might come back to that some day."

Livingston nodded and poured more wine, and he'd always liked seeing that look in Rusty eyes. Plans being made. Information being considered. It made Rusty look so alive. "What have you been up to lately?" he asked, and immediately the smile faded from Rusty's eyes and Livingston felt like cursing himself. "I'm sorry," he said at once.

"What for?" Rusty shrugged. "I've been doing nothing in particular. Just wandering round. Trying to get used to... Nothing in particular."

He sounded tired and he sounded vulnerable and Livingston had always hated that. Instinctively he reached out and squeezed Rusty's hand.

All at once Rusty turned round and kissed him, sudden and fast and urgent and _wonderful._

He sat back up with an effort, a few moments later, his head still ringing with the wonder of the kiss, and he stared at Rusty, breathlessly. "Are you _sure?" _he asked, and he was, he knew he was, even though there were always reasons why this was a bad idea.

Rusty's mouth closed over his in answer, and for a while, this was all there was and this was all he wanted.

* * *

Afterwards, and at some point in the last few hours they'd managed to make it through to the bedroom.

Rusty was still and silent, lying close to him, and his arm was slung contentedly over Livingston's chest, and part of Livingston wondered if this, this moment right here, was what Rusty had been looking for.

Danny had been in prison for a while now. So Rusty had been alone for a while now. And Rusty might say that he was trying to get used to it, but Livingston wasn't so very certain that was possible. And he supposed that Rusty might be lonely in more ways than one.

Oh, he knew that they weren't...physically intimate. But it was just that he also knew that they were _physically intimate. _He'd seen..well, probably he shouldn't say cuddling. Not anywhere Rusty might hear, anyway. But they did and now there was nothing, and maybe Rusty needed a little more than he liked to pretend.

And that made him feel kind of weird. "I'm sorry," he said softly.

There was a moment and Rusty propped himself up on one elbow and regarded him with interest. "Why?" he asked curiously.

Livingston shrugged uneasily. "I kind of feel like I've sort of taken advantage of you," he explained, waving a hand that somehow indicated alcohol and his bed and sex and Rusty being vulnerable.

Rusty stared at him blankly. "I don't _feel _taken advantage of," he said carefully and his lips were twitching.

"Well, I guess that's okay then?" Livingston suggested, and it was a little difficult not to giggle at the look on Rusty's face.

"You're drunker than I am, anyway," Rusty commented, kissing him lightly and dropping back down onto his back. "And I thought we said we weren't going to do this again?"

They had. "I'm not sorry about that," he said definitely and meant it.

He _never _meant to end up in bed with Rusty. Well, not since they'd officially stopped being a couple anyway. And that was, oh, more than nine years ago now. And still it happened. And every time they agreed it shouldn't happen again.

The first time had been about a year after they'd split up. He'd been feeling insecure after working for Larry O'Dell and Matthew Brigstock, when they'd robbed the depository in Baltimore. They'd paid him his share of the money all right, but it had been three weeks of sniggering, and whispered conversations that stopped when he entered the room, and practical jokes that weren't funny, and a steady stream of snide little comments about useless geeks and in the end he'd felt stupid and insignificant, and in desperate need of some company that actually liked him. He'd gone to see Rusty – actually, he'd gone to see Rusty and Danny, but Danny had been out for the night – and there'd been drinks, and he'd been quiet and withdrawn and Rusty had been concerned and understanding, and eventually he'd told Rusty everything, and Rusty had been furious, and they'd talked some more, and he'd never quite figured out who started the kissing. But it went on from there. In wonderful directions.

After that, well, it just kept happening. Another eight times. Not that he was counting. As long as they were both single they'd fall into bed together whenever they wanted.

The last, most embarrassing time had been in a hotel, in Malta of all places. Neither of them had slept in three days, the issue of the third camera in the villa being urgent, pressing, and apparently unsolveable. So when they _had _solved it, at four o'clock in the morning, the jubilation had been sharp and overwhelming, and he'd been kissing Rusty before he knew what was happening.

And, a little later, he discovered that Danny absolutely did not feel the need to knock when walking into Rusty's room. At least he walked back out after Livingston screamed. Even if he did tell them both to get some sleep first.

Breakfast the next morning had been awkward. Rusty had explained the third camera to Danny using bread rolls to represent them, glasses of orange juice to represent the cameras, and the cruet to represent nothing that Livingston understood. And all the while, Livingston had been trying not to even glance at Danny, until he eventually, desperately, blurted out "It wasn't what it looked like!"

Danny and Rusty had both stared at him for a long moment. "What else could it have been?" Danny had asked with interest and not even a flicker of embarrassment, and Livingston reflected that Danny took open-minded to whole new levels.

They always said that it shouldn't happen again. Because no matter how _fantastic _the sex was – and it was – neither of them was at all interested in pursuing a relationship. Friends with benefits, he supposed the phrase was, except the benefit of being friends with Rusty was the whole _being friends with Rusty _part. And that was what he never wanted to give up.

He found himself staring at the alarm clock right at the moment when the numbers clicked over to reveal a new day. 11/13/1997. And he suddenly realised another reason why Rusty might have wanted to seek him out.

"Happy Birthday, Rus'," he said softly.

There was silence. "Danny gets me cake," Rusty said at last and Livingston moved a little closer and listened. "Every year. The same kind. I never figured out where he gets it from. But the sponge is...and the cream too...and the _frosting." _He licked his lips and sighed. "I love that cake." He laughed slightly. "One year we were in Australia during my birthday, and I _knew _that he couldn't possibly have got the cake, and I wanted to tell him that it didn't matter, but I couldn't even mention it in case it did, and he took me out to dinner and when we got back to the hotel..." He smiled tenderly at something Livingston couldn't see. "He'd cleared out the mini bar. There were little bottles all over the floor, and the cake was in there, looking like it had just been baked."

"That's nice," Livingston said, soft and inadequate.

"Yeah," Rusty agreed. "It was. And every year, we sat down and ate it, and he smiled at me like...and then he told me some plan, something impossible he'd thought up, just for me. For us. And we'd do it."

Livingston heard the wrong tense, and he reached out and grabbed Rusty's hand urgently. "He's not gone forever, Rus'."

"I know," Rusty said softly. "Just feels like it."

"When did you last hear from him?" Livingston asked.

Rusty bit his lip. "I haven't. We're not...we agreed." He sighed. "There are reasons."

Livingston was sure there were. And he was equally sure that he wouldn't understand them. Without even thinking about it, he hugged Rusty tightly and briefly.

"I've never had a birthday without him," Rusty said softly, staring blankly at the ceiling, and, when Livingston frowned, added "I never did anything before. Just another day. Didn't see why it mattered. Danny didn't like that. He likes making a fuss."

Yeah. Livingston could imagine _that _very easily. "It's not forever," he said again.

"Just eight years," Rusty agreed woodenly.

"He'll be out before then," Livingston said confidently. Good behaviour or whatever. Surely.

Rusty shrugged. "Yeah. Unless he says the wrong thing to the wrong person. Or sees something he can't let go. Or..." He shook his head blindly and Livingston realised that Rusty had probably spent the last six months thinking of every possible scenario. Especially the bad ones. And there was nothing he could do about that. No reassurance he could offer, no way that he could promise that everything would be all right. "I just wish I knew how he was doing," Rusty added softly.

Livingston could hear the exhaustion, the months of fear and frustration. He bit his lip and the idea crept in his head. "The...I mean, most records in prison are computerised now. I could probably...I mean, it might be possible...if you want me to, that is."

Rusty sat up straight and stared at him.

Unnerved, he blinked, more than a little afraid that he'd overstepped some mark. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have. It's a stupid idea. I'm - "

" - you could do that?" Rusty demanded intently.

He smiled hesitantly "Yeah. I mean, probably. If I hacked into their system, I could set up a permanent trace for Danny's name. If there's any incident involving Danny, you know, if anything happens I could find out."

"Really?" Rusty breathed.

"Yeah," Livingston said and his smile was more reassuring, more comforting. "I'd need to check that it works, but hopefully I could even set it up to send any updates to your phone."

"_Thank you," _Rusty said softly, gratitude and sincerity shining in his voice.

"You're welcome," Livingston said, and rationally, he knew he should be making it clear that he wasn't promising anything, that there were any number of ways that the tech could let them down, but looking at Rusty...he was going to make this work. Even if he had to break into the prison himself.

"Don't ever tell him, okay?" Rusty said quietly.

"I'll never tell a soul," Livingston promised. Because he knew how important it would be for Rusty to be able to know that Danny was okay. And he knew that Rusty would never want to show that vulnerability to anyone. He kissed the back of Rusty's hand. "So what impossible plan did Danny get you for your last birthday?" he asked instead, and he watched Rusty smile in dawning memory, and he lay in bed and listened to the wild and improbable tale of Augustus Fairbrook, eleven identical paintings, two drummers and a golf buggy.

Sometimes the only thing to do was to be there.

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**Thanks for reading**


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